The new Xubuntu Natty (11.04) default wallpaper has been chosen. Before further explanations, here is the new wallpaper (click for full size):

(CC-BY-SA 3.0 Pasi Lallinaho & Simon Steinbeiß.)

I agree, it’s pretty stunning!

Again, we’ve come a long way from the original mockups, and source photo files. Here are four of the mockups we did to achieve a mostly blue-toned, blurred wallpaper, but with some green hues to try to step out of the all-blue image of Xubuntu (and Shimmer Project):

My first draft, exceptionally produced in pixels, not vectors.

Simon’s (ochosi) very green & nature -emphasized version. Actually it’s just a blurred photo! Very nice whatsoever.

My second draft, which is very plasma-styled. Nice, but the color tones are a bit too gray.

The last draft, made completely on a Windows machine in 10 minutes! This actually worked out really really well. It’s used as is as the base for the final wallpaper.

What about the photo used then? Well. Even if the final style resembles me a bit of northern lights, the photo is actually not from a region with northern lights, as some of the most sharp-eyed people have already noted.

This shot is by Simon Steinbeiß and it’s from the Austrian Alps. (Click for full-size. CC-BY-SA 3.0 Simon Steinbeiß.)

As some of you who work with artwork already can already tell, the photo is not chosen for the looks of the original (even though I think the atmosphere is still pretty nice), but other attributes. Most importantly, it was pretty easy to trace to vector. Other attributes while selecting the source photo were that it had tree(s) in it and that the trees didn’t look dead, since Xubuntu should not look like dead!

That’s it for this cycle and wallpaper. Thanks for your time and all the feedback.